'Bumping' - is it becoming a serious problem?

[Dr_Intoxicated]

Is that the one where they tracked a repeat offender in real time and caught them out?

 

[brehowjevidowk]

It’s become a culture of sorts; you’re not “cool” if you don’t do it regularly.

 

[bramling]

It’s become a culture of sorts; you’re not “cool” if you don’t do it regularly.

I get the feeling at the moment the culture is “I can and will do whatever I want, and who is going to stop me”. An attitude which the Covid response seems to have heavily aggravated.

 

[brehowjevidowk]

I get the feeling at the moment the culture is “I can and will do whatever I want, and who is going to stop me”. An attitude which the Covid response seems to have heavily aggravated.

Quite. And it’s true, police won’t even attend to a house burglary anymore for instance. All thanks to the tories, and I have a bad feeling that Labour won’t be any different.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Just saw a blatent tailgater at Marylebone. Pointed him out to staff who thanked me but did nothing.

 

[12LDA28C]

Just saw a blatent tailgater at Marylebone. Pointed him out to staff who thanked me but did nothing.

Someone tried to tailgate me through the barrier onto the platform at Aylesbury two weeks ago. Luckily I saw him hanging around the barriers and sussed his game. As soon as I passed through the barrier I stopped dead, so he had no space to get through and had to stay the other side. I asked him if he had a ticket and got a blank stare in response so I politely suggested he f*cked off.

 

[75A]

Someone tried to tailgate me through the barrier onto the platform at Aylesbury two weeks ago. Luckily I saw him hanging around the barriers and sussed his game. As soon as I passed through the barrier I stopped dead, so he had no space to get through and had to stay the other side. I asked him if he had a ticket and got a blank stare in response so I politely suggested he f*cked off.

Excellent, well done.

 

[infobleep]

I was followed through a wide luggage gate by two males aged about 15 recently on the Elizabeth Line. I pointed them out to station staff who couldn’t have cared less. I shared an image of them online with TfL and the BTP in the hope they would investigate and was promptly told I was the problem for sharing their image without consent. What’s the point!

Surely it was a public place so it is allowed? You weren't harassing them. Perhaps I'm wrong on this.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Does Paris still have full height turnstiles? I went through one but it shut before my large rucksack did, which was rather embarrassing!

They do, yes.

 

[Gerald Fiennes]

Couldn't the time in which the normal gates stay open be reduced by about 1/3rd? It's just so incredibly easy to tailgate at present. If people realised just how easy it is, the number doing this will increase further....

I tend to hang back before going through the gates so that there are fewer people behind me who could potentially tailgate or just visually check that the person behind has got some kind of card to get out with.

TfL, as ever, is good with press releases but what % of fare dodgers are currently being prosecuted: 1%, 0.1%, less? Clearly not enough to keep the number very low. At my local suburban TSGN station (Z5) the other afternoon, looked like there were two out of c. 100 alighters that tailgated out, one through the wide gates the other the ordinary gates... The gateline staff did remonstrate with both, even though they are asked not to.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Couldn't the time in which the normal gates stay open be reduced by about 1/3rd?

It would result in a lot of bags being trapped.

You could sound an alarm though, but isn't the issue that the staff have insufficient backup to deal with it anyway?

 

[jon0844]

Yes, staff cannot stop anyone or run after them. Cubic gates have alarms for push-throughs but when you have gangs storming shops and ripping out goods with no care in the world - I doubt they're going to be deterred by an alarm.

Offenders rarely cover their faces today, so they really do not care. They know nothing will happen. If they ARE stopped by some freak of nature, they're unlikely to be arrested. If even less likely they are arrested, they'll likely receive a slap on the wrist. Prisons are full, community service is monitored by people who are short staffed, so as long as people turn up to do their xx hours of litter picking, it's ticked off even if they do nothing but stand around on their phones 'watching the clock'.

It doesn't seem that any really cares about this sort of crime, even if it means it sends the message that you are untouchable, so you might get away with more.. and so it begins.

I know Labour isn't likely to change much, but we do need something akin to the zero tolerance policing that New York introduced to change mindsets. I am not talking about profiling people and randomly stopping and searching, but taking certain crimes more seriously. If someone is seen to commit an offence, they should be targeted - from pushing through, shoplifting, littering etc.

That would require more police and all the of the back-end staffing to process offenders, and we'd likely need more prison spaces as well as people to monitor offenders when being returned to the community. Not cheap by any means.

Is any party really serious about law and order though?

 

[Fermiboson]

I know Labour isn't likely to change much, but we do need something akin to the zero tolerance policing that New York introduced to change mindsets.

New York is not exactly getting any better with its crime problem, petty or otherwise, though. I can’t seem to find any evidence of said “zero tolerance policing” you mentioned.

 

[thomalex]

New York is not exactly getting any better with its crime problem, petty or otherwise, though. I can’t seem to find any evidence of said “zero tolerance policing” you mentioned.

This was in the 90s and was based on the broken windows theory where small crimes were tackled as allowing them allowed more serious crime to escalate.

It was very successful at the time and crime is still significantly lower than it was at its height in the early 90s , look it up.

 

[AlterEgo]

This was in the 90s and was based on the broken windows theory where small crimes were tackled as allowing them allowed more serious crime to escalate.

It was very successful at the time and crime is still significantly lower than it was at its height in the early 90s , look it up.

There is no consensus that the broken window approach prevents crime other than vandalism.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

There was a Channel 5 series a few years back about the TfL revenue protection officers which might still on My5 but not 100%

"Fare Dodgers: At War with the Law". 2019 mini series (4 episodes).

Think they're all on YouTube. Fourth episode certainly is, and is linked here...

 

[Thirteen]

I'm surprised we've not seen barriers upgraded to perhaps be higher to prevent people bumping.

 

[Meerkat]

I'm surprised we've not seen barriers upgraded to perhaps be higher to prevent people bumping.

I don’t think there are allowable physical solutions.
The answer is prosecutions of repeat offenders, very public, with stiff penalties, to get through to Tik Tok etc that is not a guaranteed free ride (And also reassure the rest of us that we aren’t mugs for paying!)

 

[jon81uk]

I'm surprised we've not seen barriers upgraded to perhaps be higher to prevent people bumping.

Higher barriers won't prevent tailgating.

But plain clothes revenue protection do watch the barriers and approach those who push through, it happened to me when my Oyster wasn't read properly. I had a travelcard at the time so I continued on after he scanned the card. What is needed is a combination of more revenue protection staff and some high profile cases to get out so people know you will get caught if you do it repeatedly.

 

[Bluejays]

Seems to be a big problem everywhere now, but endemic at the London stations I pass through. I'd love to see more btp recruited and funded from railway budgets, with the catch that they have to spend at least half of their time rostered helping rpi's . About time the serial evaders and 'bumpers' got their comeuppance.

*Obviously wouldn't want to see police getting involved over wrong time advances etc or checking tickets themselves, but chasing down gate jumpers and taking details from those who refuse to give details to revenue teams would be very useful indeed.
Personally, I really do think the levels of antisocial behaviour would drop massively and noticeably aswell if ticketless travel was tackled.

 

[Hadders]

Seems to be a big problem everywhere now, but endemic at the London stations I pass through. I'd love to see more btp recruited and funded from railway budgets, with the catch that they have to spend at least half of their time rostered helping rpi's . About time the serial evaders and 'bumpers' got their comeuppance.

*Obviously wouldn't want to see police getting involved over wrong time advances etc or checking tickets themselves, but chasing down gate jumpers and taking details from those who refuse to give details to revenue teams would be very useful indeed.
Personally, I really do think the levels of antisocial behaviour would drop massively and noticeably aswell if ticketless travel was tackled.

Fare evasion will be way down the list of priorities for the BTP.

 

[Starmill]

Just saw a blatent tailgater at Marylebone. Pointed him out to staff who thanked me but did nothing.

They may have reported that person before and made a note to add this time to their list of reports. But yes realistically that's the most they can do.

 

[bramling]

There is no consensus that the broken window approach prevents crime other than vandalism.

There is some evidence that fare evasion has a habit of being linked with other crimes.

The problem is that the railway tends to focus on the low-hanging fruit, eg your stereotypical student who has short fared, or whatever. Whilst not in any way condoning that type of fare evasion, it means the “I ain’t paying wha you gonna do bruv” types tend to be left to get on with it, unless there’s a big joint BTP/revenue sting operation. On balance I’d prefer more effort to be targeted on the second group, as they are the ones more likely to assault staff and in many cases be associated with other crimes both on and off the railway.

 

[Recessio]

Just saw a blatent tailgater at Marylebone. Pointed him out to staff who thanked me but did nothing.

Ironic given how strongly Chiltern pursue penalty fare cases in court (see any of the threads over in that section of the forum) that they don't care about catching one in the act!

 

[CyrusWuff]

Ironic given how strongly Chiltern pursue penalty fare cases in court (see any of the threads over in that section of the forum) that they don't care about catching one in the act!

Unless Revenue Protection staff and/or British Transport Police are around, there's very little that most station staff can do in such cases.

 

[Bluejays]

Fare evasion will be way down the list of priorities for the BTP.

Hence my suggestion for additional officers, fully funded from rail budgets

There is some evidence that fare evasion has a habit of being linked with other crimes.

The problem is that the railway tends to focus on the low-hanging fruit, eg your stereotypical student who has short fared, or whatever. Whilst not in any way condoning that type of fare evasion, it means the “I ain’t paying wha you gonna do bruv” types tend to be left to get on with it, unless there’s a big joint BTP/revenue sting operation. On balance I’d prefer more effort to be targeted on the second group, as they are the ones more likely to assault staff and in many cases be associated with other crimes both on and off the railway.

Couldn't agree more !

 

[Bletchleyite]

Hence my suggestion for additional officers, fully funded from rail budgets

They could start by using contract security guards for what they are actually useful for - additional staff at gatelines to protect the railway staff so they can challenge such people. Rather than have them attempt to do (badly) the job of railway staff without the requisite fares knowledge.

 

[Hadders]

Hence my suggestion for additional officers, fully funded from rail budgets

My view is the police should respond to crime based on its risk, seriousness, urgency etc not on the basis of who funds them.

 

[Bluejays]

They could start by using contract security guards for what they are actually useful for - additional staff at gatelines to protect the railway staff so they can challenge such people. Rather than have them attempt to do (badly) the job of railway staff without the requisite fares knowledge.

Good idea !

My view is the police should respond to crime based on its risk, seriousness, urgency etc not on the basis of who funds them.

A perfectly reasonable moral view.

 

[bramling]

They could start by using contract security guards for what they are actually useful for - additional staff at gatelines to protect the railway staff so they can challenge such people. Rather than have them attempt to do (badly) the job of railway staff without the requisite fares knowledge.

Or pestering railway enthusiasts, though to be fair this doesn’t seem to be quite so much of a thing nowadays as it has been at times over the last couple of decades.